Lolly had the television at full volume when Harper came in the back door.

‘There you are!’ She turned the volume off. ‘You just missed your mum and dad on the phone. Where’ve you been?’

‘Working on a school project.’

‘Heavens, they’re still making you do work when it’s nearly time to leave for good? That’s a bit rough, pet.’

‘It’s okay. It’s something I like doing.’

Harper dropped her bag on the floor. Annie and Murph looked up briefly from their beds. ‘Where’s Hector?’ she asked.

‘Probably on your bed, as usual. Now, sit down. I’ve made us a cold dinner.’

On the table there was bread, cheese and salad things. Lolly asked Harper to get the mayonnaise. In the fridge door there were still two bottles of lemonade. Harper had a moment of guilt about that.

‘Do you want the lemonade, too, Lolly? I’m sorry we didn’t remember to drink it at the party.’

‘Absolutely not,’ Lolly replied. ‘It’s horrible stuff.’

Harper smiled and shut the fridge. But Lolly seemed rattled.

‘Did something happen with you and Angus?’

Lolly scoffed. ‘There is no me and Angus. He’s a silly old man.’ She shook salt vigorously over a plate of sliced tomatoes. ‘So I hope you’ve finished your research because I don’t want you going over there again.’

Harper sat down and thought she’d better change the subject.

‘Lolly, do you remember that cadet badge from a few months ago? It fell on the floor and you thought the cats had been playing with it. You said it was from World War One, like the glasses.’

‘I know exactly the one you mean, pet.’

‘Can you remember anything about that badge, like exactly where you found it? Was it near a tree with a long arm that stretches right out across the river?’

‘I didn’t find it at the river.’

‘But you said it was from mudlarking, Lolly!’

‘Did I? I don’t remember saying that. I’m sure it was in my mother’s jewellery box. Only there were no boys in the family who were the right age for cadets in World War One so I never knew whose it was.’

So one badge was always here, after all.

One badge was passed down through the Lamb family. Harper had a hunch it was Molly’s, given to her by Vince. She stuffed her mouth with cheese and lettuce as the tangled story started to make sense.

Molly’s badge, calm and still. Mae’s badge, a lively one, haunted maybe.

In the river now.

Lolly carried on talking about the war but Harper was only half-listening. Her thoughts returned to Will and what he’d told her.

I didn’t fire a single shot on Gallipoli. I didn’t kill anyone when I went to war. In fact, I fired more bullets in training. The picture in the library says ‘killed in action’ but there wasn’t any action for me. I got sick in the trenches not long after we’d landed on the beaches. So sick I couldn’t move. Arthur stayed with me for days. Eventually they stretchered me down and took me on a little boat to the hospital ship. I reckon I was dead no more than a day later. Do you still think I’m brave?

She did, of course, but he was impossible to convince.

The cats walked side by side to the balcony where they stopped and sat in front of the flyscreen. Their tails flickered and Harper tried to see what they were both looking at.

A large black bird with a bright white eye was on a branch not far from the balcony railings. It was a raven like the ones at school. The cats chattered to it.

‘What are you looking at?’ Lolly said. ‘Oh! It’s her again.’

‘Who?’

‘She’s just kicked her young ones out. Their nest is always right there. I leave her some grapes and grains to help her out. Very demanding, baby ravens. But she’s a darling. She brings me things to say thank you. They’re such clever birds.’

The raven took flight from the branch. As she headed up and over the building something clattered on the balcony table. Ting! Harper felt she knew exactly what it was from the sound. She scooped a cat in each arm and tried to hold on to them as they mewed and kicked in protest.

‘What’s going on?’ said Lolly, who looked amused.

Harper dumped the cats in her lap. ‘Hold them a minute,’ she said.

Then she opened the flyscreen.

Her heart flipped over when she saw a cadet badge on the table. She grabbed it and shut the screen again.

‘Okay, Lolly, you can let them go.’

The cats screeched and bolted down the hallway.

‘All this commotion is giving me indigestion. Will you tell me what’s going on?’ said Lolly.

‘In a second.’

Harper ran to her bedroom, holding the cadet badge tightly.

The other one was still there.